Thank you, Sen. Olympia Snowe, for pointing out what Mitt Romney needs to do to win over women for the Republican ticket in November: just “disassociate himself” from the “language on abortion contained in the GOP platform.” And pretend that when Rep. Todd Akin said women can’t get pregnant from “legitimate rape” he was just some nut spouting crazy talk, and was not in fact exposing the philosophical underpinnings of today’s Republican Party (“How the GOP can mend image among women,” Aug. 26).

She left out one additional disassociation requirement: Romney needs to disassociate himself from his own running mate, Rep. Akin’s good friend, Paul Ryan. They co-sponsored the bill that tried to deny abortions except for victims of “forcible” (i.e. “legitimate”) rape.

“This is not where I hoped my party would be in 2012,” writes Sen. Snowe. That’s why she’s leaving office. But as she’s leaving, she wants women to take a flyer on a Republican party that exists only in her hopeful imagination.

Women can save themselves the effort of Sen. Snowe’s painful contortions by disassociating ourselves from a party dedicated to taking away our basic rights.